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Today I have with me the bestselling author of the "Terms" series, Lorrie Farrelly. Lorrie Farrelly is the author of a Western historical romance trilogy, contemporary romantic suspense novels, and sci-fi/paranormal romantic suspense novels. A graduate of the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Northwestern University, she has earned READERS’ FAVORITE 5 STARS and been an ORANGE ROSE AWARD finalist. She’s been a Renaissance nominee for Teacher of the Year, a ranch hand at Disneyland's Circle D Ranch, and a “Jeopardy!” champion. She and her family live in Southern California.

Welcome toNjkinny's World of Books, Lorrie!

I am so happy to have you for virtual coffee. Lets grab our mugs and start this interview. :)

Q1. Tell me something about yourself.

I’m the author of
a Western historical romance trilogy, contemporary romantic suspense
novels, and sci-fi/paranormal romantic suspense novels. A graduate of the
University of California, Santa Cruz, and Northwestern University, I’ve
earned READERS’ FAVORITE 5 STARS and been an ORANGE ROSE AWARD finalist.
I’ve been a Renaissance nominee for Teacher of the Year, and a summer
ranch hand at (California) Disneyland’s Circle D Ranch (caring for the
horses that pull the Main Street streetcars, the castle moat swans, and
the Jungle Cruise cockatoo – yes, he’s real!). I was on the television game
show Jeopardy! and did pretty
well, thanks to my knowledge of random, useless stuff. I love travel, writing, movies, kids and
animals, and, of course, books! My family and I live in Southern
California.

Q2. Which books have you written till date?My novels to date
are:

TERMS OF SURRENDER: Western historical romance, set
1865-1867. Former Civil War cavalryman who has lost everything heads west;
stands with a young woman and her little brother who are defending their land
and their lives against a treacherous land baron.

TERMS OF ENGAGEMENT: 2nd book in the series, set
in 1885. The little brother from first novel has grown up and is now a doctor,
as well as a widower with a young daughter. He shelters a woman and her toddler
son, who are on a desperate flight from a cruel, wealthy, abusive man.Buy From Amazon.com:Kindle EditionBuy From Amazon.in:Kindle Edition

TERMS OF TEMPTATION: 3rd book in the series, set
in the late 19th-early 20th centuries. Courageous,
impulsive daughter of Civil War veteran and rancher has a passion for wildlife
conservation and rehabilitation – and for an obstinate game warden.

Please note all three books can be read as
stand-alone novels. However, because characters recur, reading them in order
would be most satisfying.

TIMELAPSE: Sci fi/time-travel romantic adventure. A
desperate man stranded in a world he no longer recognizes joins with a
courageous young freedom fighter. To have a future, they must somehow prevent a
terrible crime from occurring – over 100 years in the past.Buy From Amazon.com: Kindle EditionBuy From Amazon.in: Paperback | Kindle Edition

DANGEROUS: Contemporary romantic suspense. A former Los
Angeles police officer, weary of stress and urban violence, moves to a small,
Central California town in search of a peaceful haven. He should have been more
careful what he wished for!Buy From Amazon.com:Paperback | Kindle EditionBuy From Amazon.in:Paperback | Kindle Edition

THE GUARDIAN’S ANGEL: Contemporary, paranormal romantic
suspense. A detective and a child therapist who share an uncanny psychic link
take a young murder witness – a small, autistic boy – on a desperate flight to
safety.Buy From Amazon.com:Kindle EditionBuy From Amazon.in:Paperback | Kindle Edition

Q3. You write varied books falling under different genres. Out of all these
genres which is your favorite and why?

I’m a huge fan of
happy endings, but I like to get there with twists and turns and lots of
suspense. I also always love a
touch (and sometimes much more than a touch) of the paranormal, and
everything I write has such an element. (Time-travel, ESP, ghosts, angels,
etc. – but no zombies, vampires, or werewolves.)

Q4. where do you get your ideas? What kind of research do you do for your
books?

Some of my books
have settings such as Lee’s surrender at Appomattox (ending the American
Civil War) or life in turn-of-the-20th-century Washington, D.C.
Those required quite a bit of research, but I enjoyed doing it because I
was so interested in those times and events. Others, such as Dangerous,
have settings I’m quite familiar with, and so required less research. But
honestly, research can be so much fun and so involving that sometimes I
almost forget to actually do the writing!

Q5. I recently read your book Terms of Surrender and really
liked it. Tell us something about this book and what kind of research did you
do for this?

Western
historical romance Terms of Surrender was my debut novel, and in many ways
it remains closest to my heart. In sorting through a box of old family
keepsakes and papers, I found two documents that had belonged to my Great
Grandfather, who had been an infantryman in the Confederate 42nd
Georgia Regiment during the American Civil War. One of the documents was a
Parole Pass, something I’d never even heard of before. Following the
defeat of the Confederacy (which was as it should be) and Lee’s surrender,
most Confederate soldiers were considered prisoners of war, and therefore,
had to be officially paroled. The other document was an Oath of
Allegiance. Defeated soldiers were allowed to go home only if they swore
never again to bear arms, or take any hostile action, against the United
States. (With a bit of literary license, I combined both documents into
one in the novel.)

I was so intrigued and moved by this. What would such a
defeated soldier feel? Bitterness and loss, certainly. Would he still have hope
for the future? What if he had nothing to go home to? (Much of the South had
been ravaged.) Not only that, but many officers in the Confederate Army had
actually been United States Army officers prior to the war. Quite a few were
West Point (US Military Academy) graduates. What kind of struggles of
conscience had these men had, and what compelled them to turn their backs on
the nation they’d sworn to defend? For many, it was a terrible, heart-breaking
decision, complicated by the barbarity of slavery. These were all issues one of
the main characters of the story, former cavalry Captain Michael Cantrell, must
face.

Q6. Which was your first book? Do you have any happy memory related to it?

Please see #5.

Q7. What are the steps that you follow to get your books published? How has
the method changed (if it has) since the first time you got published to the
present day?

As an independent
author, I published through Amazon Digital Services. I had had some
frustrating experiences in the past with publishing house editors. One
complained that she “didn’t see what the West had to do with the Civil
War,” and another wanted “nicer” villains. I ultimately decided to take my
work, and my career, into my own hands. It was very much the right
decision for me, and it has remained so.

Q8. How do you promote your books and why do you prefer this method?

Promotion
and marketing are, for me, the toughest parts of being an independent writer.
Most authors, by nature, I think, tend to live in their heads. I’m certainly
not a natural saleswoman, so I’ve had to learn to get pretty far out of my
comfort zone. Keeping in close communication with a large community of authors
has really helped me find avenues in which to promote my books. And as there
are – however sadly – no big chain
bookstores in my area anymore (nor any small ones either, save one tiny
used book store), the internet has become my book community

Q9. Tell us ten things about yourself that no one knows.

(I’m going to
amend “no one” to “no one except my family and closest friends,” because
they pretty much know everything. :) )

I had a summer job as a ranch hand at Disneyland;

I majored in English and Theater but actually taught high
school math;

I have no fear of snakes or lizards, but am scared to death
of bugs and spiders (except cute bugs like butterflies and ladybugs);

My mom loved poetry and was always writing verse, so she
gave me first and (maiden) last names that rhymed with “The Rain in Spain;”

In researching family history to Way-Back-When, I discovered
two of the founding chieftains of the family clan were Ian the Toothless and
Murdock the Stunted;

I’m a sucker for movies with dinosaurs or dragons or giant
crocodiles or Sharknados;

Q11. Had you not been a writer, what profession would you have chosen and
why?

Actually,
writing’s my second career. When I was in college, my dad asked me, “So,
what will it be? Nursing or teaching?” I hated the idea of bedpans. Thank
goodness I turned out to love teaching! :)

Q12. If you could go back in the past, what is the one thing that you would
change in your life and why?

Truthfully, I’d
hesitate to change anything, because I wouldn’t want my life or those people I love to change. After all,
everything has consequences, and we don’t always foresee them. This is an
idea I ran with in Timelapse, and that also drives the brilliant Stephen
King's novel 11/22/63.

Q13. How has the writing world changed since the first time to the present
day? Has it changed for better or for worse and why?

I
think there are many, many more opportunities for writers today in every field
imaginable. At the same time, there is an overwhelming amount of material out
there, and not all of it is of professional quality. Getting noticed and
developing a career in writing is as tough as it ever was, maybe more so.

Q14. What advise would you give to the newbie authors/ the aspiring ones?

Be persistent.
Write well. (To do this, a person must read, read, read!) Join in the
online community of readers and writers and pay attention to what they say
has worked for them. Make every effort to put your work forward in a
professional manner. And by all means, write the book you’d love to read!

Q15. What are your upcoming books?

I have a couple
of works in progress at the moment, but am not close to publishing them
yet.

The wounded man's grip was like iron. Annie
couldn't imagine where his strength was coming from. She could feel his whole
body trembling against her, and the bandages wrapped around his shoulder and
chest were soaked with sweat and fresh blood.

"No!" he cried, glaring at her with
wide, wild eyes, feral and ferocious in the candlelight. "You can't ...
have him! I ... let him ... before ... No! Gavin!"

"Captain Cantrell! Michael!" Unable to
wrench his hands from their grip on her small brother, Annie shifted and took
Michael's face in her hands, her fingers spread along both sides of his hard,
sweat-slick jaw. Turning his head, she forced him to look into her eyes.

"Michael!" she commanded.
"Listen! You must let go! He's not Gavin!"

A flicker of confused uncertainty came into the
man's eyes, and the huge, black, dilated pupils seemed to constrict slightly,
giving Annie a glimpse of deep blue irises.

"Yes, that's right, that's right. Good. Now
listen to me, listen to me." Her words, and the gentle stroking of her
fingers, became fluid, hypnotic.

And finally, Michael listened. He could feel the
warmth of her breath on his cheek, and for a single, brief moment all pain
disappeared, replaced abruptly by a great hitch in his chest. He was dead
certain his heart had stopped.

JESSIE swam up from a deep, dreamless sleep, a relaxed,
satisfied smile still curving the corners of her mouth. She stretched
luxuriously and reached for Alex.

Eyes still closed, she frowned at the rough feel of a heavy wool
blanket next to her skin. What did she need a blanket for? It was summertime,
and the room was already warm. She stirred, but instead of Alex's arms cradling
her, she felt the coarse, lumpy cushion of a pile of burlap sacks. Jessie
opened her eyes, decided reasonably that she was still dreaming, and closed
them again.

A moment later she came wide-awake with a jolt of full-blown
panic.

As though still trapped in sleep, she tried to scream, but her
throat closed and she couldn't make a sound. She thrashed against the blanket
that tangled around her and gave in to hysteria.

Then, mercifully, the screams came.

"Alex! Alex! ALEX!"

He seemed to materialize out of nowhere in the dim light,
wrapping her struggling body in his arms, pulling her protectively against him.
Her cheek rubbed against coarse, starched fabric, her hands caught in straps
that seemed to run vertically up his chest. The strange sensations increased
her confusion and she struggled frantically to escape. Alex tightened his hold,
letting her flail against him. He murmured soothing reassurances into her ear,
his voice hoarse and strained.

Finally his words got through to her. She sank down against him,
her heart racing like that of a wild creature. Alex sat on the pile of dusty
sacks, leaned back against the rough stone wall in the corner of what seemed to
be an old storage cellar, rocked her gently. He continued to murmur soothing
words to her, and when she had calmed enough to listen, he tried to explain the
unexplainable.

"It brought us both, Jessie," he said, a sort of giddy
wonder in his voice. "One of us must have stumbled on the program. No
matter, it brought us both."

"What...brought us?" She had no idea what he was
talking about.

He risked easing his hold on her long enough to tug the device
from a pocket and place it in her hand. She stared at it without comprehension.
Then, as realization dawned, she regarded it with awestruck horror. She gripped
his arm with one hand, clutched the small device with the other.

"But where, Alex? Where did it bring
us?" Desperately Jessie looked around again, but the cellar receded into
shadows. She could see only stacks of crates, barrels, and piled sacks. A
small, grill-covered window high on one wall admitted just the faintest gray
shaft of early-morning light.

Alex shook his head and gently opened her fist.

"Not where,” he said, and after a long moment,
she hesitantly followed his rapt gaze to the device's small, glowing screen.
"Not where, Jessie. When."

Thanks for talking to me Lorrie. I absolutely loved talking to you and wish you all the very best for your future endeavors. Njkinny's World of Books hopes to read more from you. :)

I totally loved and enjoyed reading Lorrie's book Terms of Surrender and am currently getting myself Wowed while reading Timelapse. Some great and very varied books from a very talented author, I loved her fascinating answers and her passion for writing. It showed in her witty and bubbly answers during the interview. I hope you all will enjoy reading this chat and also read her books. Don't forget to go visit her on her various hangouts on the internet and show her some love. :)